The Supreme Court is back from its recess to begin its new nine-month term on Monday. However, the first major case will begin on Tuesday, which will decide whether or not a longstanding anti-discrimination law that bars sex discrimination in the workplace protects gay and transgender employees.
LBGTQ activists can cite various cases of discrimination, and most happen in states where gender identity and sexual orientation aren’t explicitly protected classes under the law. While the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission says that they will enforce Title VII protections when sexual orientation or gender identity is involved regardless of state, the question to be answered is do they have the authority to do so.
Due to this question the court has taken up three different cases, two of which deal with sexual orientation while the other deals with gender identity. Adam Romero, the federal policy director at the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law, details that, “What these cases will decide is does the federal statute that prohibits sex discrimination in employment, cover discrimination on the basis of someone’s sexual orientation or their gender identity, because those forms of discrimination are sex-based.”
Regardless of the decision, Romero believes the decision will go far beyond just employment. “Its impact will be most immediately on employment, but the question of discrimination in housing, in education, in public accommodations, in credit and other sort of vital spheres of our lives, there are statutes that prohibit sex discrimination in those settings.” Ultimately the court’s decision here “will inform courts’ decision in these other contexts as well.”
